Going Californian
by peroxidepest17
Summary: Carlos and James have become Californian.


**Title:** Going Californian  
** Universe:** Big Time Rush  
**Theme/Topic: **Keeping each other warm in a Minnesota winter  
**Rating:** G  
**Character/Pairing/s:** Carlos, James, Logan, Kendall  
**Spoilers/Warnings:** None  
**Word Count:** 1,460  
**Summary:** Carlos and James have become _Californian_.  
**Dedication:** mousapelli's request on my holiday gift fic meme! This was probably not what you had in mind.  
**A/N:** I feel like I should write more BTR but everything they do is too perfect and just makes me want to rewatch episodes instead of write. So you can imagine this was very hard. God I love them.  
**Disclaimer:**No harm or infringement intended.

* * *

"We're dying. It has to be because we're dying," Carlos says with a look terrified despair on his face, huddled as he is under all the couch cushions that can currently be found in the Knights' living room. James nods in sober agreement from his spot pressed to Carlos's side under the cushions. He is, Kendall notes, also dramatically shivering like he's trying to reenact that scene Camille had been rehearsing for her _Les Miserables_ audition last week. James and Carlos both peek out from under their furniture fort warily, glaring at Kendall and Logan and refusing to come out. This has been the story for the past two hours, ever since they stepped off the plane from LA and back into Minnesota.

"I'm too young to die!" James wails, and burrows closer to Carlos.

Logan sighs. "Everyone is technically dying," he says logically, by way of comfort. "That's what getting older actually means. So really, you've been dying since the minute you were born." Logan fails at comfort.

James and Carlos respond by looking at each other and shrieking at the tops of their lungs. "WE'RE DYING!"

"I knew it!" Carlos wails.

Kendall glares at Logan. Logan shrugs back—it's true after all— and the terrified lumps under the couch cushions start making sobbing noises. One about how he's too beautiful to die and the other about how he still has to try carne asada French fries when they get back to California.

"Guys," Kendall says, attempting to sound reasonable, "it's Minnesota. It's December. It's cold. Remember how this used to be nothing to us? This used to be _normal_ to us."

James pokes his head out from the cushion fort. "That's when we weren't _dying_!" he snaps, before ducking back in, as if exposure to the air _inside Kendall's living room_ will somehow infect him with even more of the freezing death they'd gotten a taste of while waiting outside the airport for Carlos's dad to pick them up.

"Look, it's almost two already," Kendal wheedles impatiently, because there are only so many hours of viable daylight for them to use during a Minnesota winter. It is waning fast, and even then, the quality of what they do get is not so great in terms of what the word _daylight _means. Because rather than direct sun, it seems a lot more like seeing a flashlight trying to shine through a fleece blanket. It reminds Kendall of that faintly glowing grey mood-lighting Griffin had almost made them use for their last music video. Kendall says _almost_ because somehow, the special tinted bulbs had all inexplicably—_cough, cough_—malfunctioned mid-shoot. "The ice is calling our names. Are you guys coming or not?"

"NOT!" Carlos and James shout back in perfect tandem, and burrow deeper into their fort for warmth.

Obviously, over the last two years on the West Coast, Carlos and James have somehow morphed into those magical, insensible creatures of legend that the rest of Los Angeles is comprised of. The ones who can't adapt to weather conditions that aren't at least within two degrees of _perfect _in either direction. The ones who freak out behind the wheels of their cars in _light rain _and only understand snow in that they think it either comes from snow machines on command or is made up of cotton and glitter and put up in festive winter displays at the mall.

Kendall grips his hockey stick in frustration, feeling sweat and general grossness starting to build under the collar of his jersey as he waits indoors while being dressed for outdoors. It is perfect, icy, hockey weather _outside_ and he, for one, looks forward to playing in the open air instead of the stifling rinks sheltered in the indoor shopping malls and skating arenas back in sunny California. They get to come back here once, maybe twice a year, and he plans on taking advantage of it. And as far as he's concerned, the only way to fully take advantage of it to the fullest is to go out onto the ice with all of his best friends right there beside him, playing along.

Except somewhere along the way, Carlos and James have gone and turned incredibly _Californian _on him.

He and Logan share a look. "Well?" he demands, while Carlos and James bemoan the fact that the world outside is dead and the four of them might just be the sole survivors of the devastating snow-apocalypse currently trapping them indoors.

Logan shrugs back at Kendall helplessly. "Well, I mean, temperature is relative, right?" he says after a moment, in a way that makes zero sense to Kendall, because Kendall is pretty sure temperatures are absolute. It's how they measure things.

Logan sighs and sidesteps a little to the left, making eyes at Kendall to follow him. Kendall dutifully sidesteps until he is next to Logan again and waits for Logan to explain himself. "It's like this," Logan begins, sounding nerdy just starting off. That's usually a pretty good sign. "When you get into the pool at the Palm Woods the first second you jump in, it's cold, right?"

Kendall nods. "Yeah."

Logan makes a circular motion with his hand. "But after a few minutes, you get used to it, and you don't notice that it's cold anymore, right?"

"Right."

"And remember in PE, when Coach Driscoll made us run laps outside after we broke into the supply cabinet and wrapped Carlos in all the spare Ace bandages when he wanted to be a mummy for the Halloween assembly?"

Kendall grins. He does remember that. "Yeah."

"Running like that was freezing at first, but the more we did it, the warmer we got, until we had to take off our sweaters and finish the last lap in our t-shirts, right?"

Kendall thinks he's starting to get where Logan is going with this. "So what you're saying is, we need to make them warm enough inside that outside seems _nice_?"

Logan looks satisfied with that. "Exactly."

Kendall waits for the other shoe to drop.

Logan blinks back at him.

"Well?" Kendall prompts, when he loses patience.

Logan frowns. "Well, what?"

Kendall sighs. "How do we do it?" He gestures to the weepy cushion fort on his living room floor. "They're not exactly willing to move."

Logan shrugs. "I'm the theory guy, you're the practice guy."

It is true. Kendall gives up on getting any more help from his smart friend. He crosses his arms, stares at the James and Carlos piles in front of him, and thinks.

Twelve seconds later, there is a _ding_ and Kendall suddenly has it. The ding itself had come from Katie's bag of popcorn finishing in the microwave, but that is neither here nor there. Katie has always had good timing, and Kendall has always responded well to audio cues.

"I've got it," he says, and grins a little bit evilly down at the cushion fort.

Logan looks a little dubious in response, like he doesn't like where this is going. "Just because you heard a timer go off doesn't mean…"

Kendall grabs his smaller friend before he can finish that thought and steers him back towards the cushions housing their friends. "No, really, I have an idea," he says.

Logan relaxes slightly. "Oh, well. Okay then."

Kendall promptly tosses Logan on top of Carlos and James and their precariously constructed fallout shelter.

At the sounds of their screams of surprise as the walls of the fort come tumbling down around them, Kendall smirks, throws down his hockey stick and his gloves, and dives down on top of all three of them with a very satisfactory thud.

From there, there is a lot of screaming and flailing and general chaos that, Kendall will admit, is very difficult to bear under the weight of all his heavy (and incredibly warm) hockey gear. On the other hand, his gear also cushions him from all the fist-flinging and general mayhem of James and Carlos responding to a sneak attack in the only way they know how.

Five minutes later, it is definitely too hot to be inside anymore and all of Kendall's best friends have completely forgotten about their Californian metamorphosis in lieu of angrily chasing him down the street and over all manner of ice and snow. They are also trying to hit him with their hockey equipment.

They'll probably stop being angry with him within the next hour, once they've gotten tired of hitting him with sticks, and in the two hours after that, they'll use the daylight they have left to play a rousing 2-on-2 scrimmage over Sutter Pond.

Kendall whoops and thinks that despite all the sudden _California-ness_, it's still going to be a perfect Minnesota Christmas.

**END**


End file.
